


Colours in the Fog

by cylobaby27



Category: James Bond (Craig movies), James Bond - All Media Types, Skyfall (2012) - Fandom
Genre: F/F, Fem!Q, First Time, Friends to Lovers, Slow Build, and lucy liu!Bond, fem!Bond - Freeform, genderbent, natalie dormer!Q, specifically, spies doing spy things
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-12
Updated: 2014-12-12
Packaged: 2018-03-01 03:27:51
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,415
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2757854
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cylobaby27/pseuds/cylobaby27
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After crashing in Q's flat, Bond learns that: Q's horrible sense of style extends to her interior decorating; no matter what Bond does, Q doesn't seem impressed; and Bond's crush on the other woman is slowly but surely blossoming out of control.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Colours in the Fog

**Author's Note:**

> Casting inspired by this post on Tumblr: http://turianbatman.tumblr.com/post/92550238729/do-you-expect-me-to-talk-no-ms-bond-i-expect

The first time Bond broke into Q’s apartment, she nearly got killed for her effort. The window had been surprisingly easy to jiggle open once she had spotted and avoided the alarm wires. She kept her hands on the windowsill to keep her landing on the carpet inside light, but it was still enough to trigger the pressure plate she had landed on. 

The plate clicked as it activated, and there was a quiet crackle as the security measures around the room energized. Slowly, Bond stood up fully, holding up her hands. “I come in peace,” she assured the room at large, scanning the area for a way to disarm it. She had her Beretta in her shoulder holster, but the pressure plate was bound to be bulletproof. There was a chance Bond could jump back out the window before the defenses activated, but knowing Q, her security measures would have been built to counter even Bond’s speed. 

Bond straightened when a red laser scanned her face, dancing over her features and then narrowing onto her eyes before disappearing. There was a quiet hiss as the plate deactivated.

Quickly, Bond stepped onto a safer patch of carpet. 

“You know, I have a door. It even has a doorbell attached,” Q said from the threshold. Bond had landed in her living room, as planned. The flat was modest and cluttered, but apparently its appearance didn’t give a true indication of the security measures. Bond had given the apartment a cursory investigation before she’d decided to barge in, and had deemed it safe. She should have known better than to underestimate MI6’s youngest Quartermaster. “Most people announce their presence before showing up uninvited to someone’s residence. In case you hadn’t heard.”

Bond ignored that. “Shouldn’t you at least have a baseball bat or something?” she asked. 

It was nearly three in the morning, and though Q had a navy dressing gown wrapped over her striped pajamas, she seemed wide-awake behind her large-framed glasses. “A baseball bat, she says,” Q drawled. 

“For all you knew, I was an intruder,” Bond said. 

“You are an intruder,” Q pointed out, making Bond huff a laugh. “If I hadn’t already programmed my systems to recognize you, you wouldn’t have been able to pose much of a threat.”

“Expecting me?” Bond asked, smile growing. 

Q rolled her eyes. “You’ve been hard to get rid of. Like mold. I decided to take precautions before I ended up sending 2,000 volts of electricity through everyone’s favorite double-oh.”

“Everyone’s?”

“Of course that’s the part you listened to,” Q said. “Don’t get a big head.” 

“Never,” Bond assured her, striding further into the flat. The couch in front of a set of computer monitors looked warm and plush, covered in throw blankets and fluffy pillows. Q clearly spent a fair amount of time in the room, if the worn keys on the keyboard sitting on the coffee table were anything to go by. Behind Q was a short hallway, presumably holding her bedroom and water closet. The kitchen was off the Bond’s right, though calling it a kitchen was generous. Bond had seen larger set-ups in airplanes. Compared to Skyfall, the whole flat was miniscule, but instead of finding it stifling, Bond found that it was…cozy. Impatiently, she waited for Q to order her out, or at least ask how the mission had gone. Q had stayed on comm until the objective had been completed, but it had still been hours since Bond had boarded the flight in Surinam. “I didn’t expect so much…”

“Mess? Yes, it’s the sign of a genius intellect,” Q pointed out.

“Colour,” Bond corrected, picking up a decorative pillow from the couch. The patchwork was a mess of oranges and blues, with some hot pink added in for no discernible reason.

Q snorted. “Have you seen the rest of this country? There’re plenty of bland grays and blues to be found in HQ, thank you very much. When I’m home, there’s no need to be professional.”

“Except for when your coworkers come by,” Bond said. 

“Are you here on official business?”

Bond faltered. “No.”

“Then I don’t need to be professional. Fancy a cuppa before I turn in?”

Bond shook her head. “Not unless you’ve got some scotch.”

“Hm, fresh out,” Q said. “There’s a spare toothbrush in the hall bath.”

“Sorry?”

“Bond, it’s past three in the morning. It may be a Saturday, but that does not mean I don’t want to get some sleep. If you’d come by for company, you’d have used the damn door. Unless you got into a fight on the plane, you don’t have any injuries you wouldn’t have already patched up yourself. Your breath smells of alcohol, but not enough to make you drunk, so this isn’t some alcohol-fueled attempt at seduction. You want somewhere to crash. I have a couch, though its colors apparently offend your tame sensibilities. Did I miss anything?” 

Bond shook her head, and Q nodded crisply. “Goodnight, Bond.”

***

As a rule, Bond avoided getting emotionally attached to people. The few cases where she had—notably, Vesper—she had been swiftly reminded why it was such a terrible idea. In her line of work, no one stuck around long. Bond often found temporary companionship on her missions, but she had learned long ago to use seduction as a weapon, one that could be just as effective at accomplishing her goals as any gun or blunt instrument. Bond knew how to play people when she could and how to blow everything to hell when she couldn’t. There was no reason to go to bed alone when it could further her objective, but there was just as little reason to let her guard down. 

She drove fast cars, drank the finest liquor when she could find, gambled with her life on a daily basis, slept with everyone she desired, and swept in and out of people’s lives like a high-speed train whipping past.

Sometimes the best disguises were the flashiest. 

With Q, though, there was no room for disguises. At the end of the day, Bond was essentially a weapon that Q pointed and fired. Bond’s job was to protect Queen and country, and Q’s job was to tell her the best way to do that. Through earpieces and CCTV cameras, Q watched Bond exchange her masks, and was therefore the only person to glimpse the person the agent was in between. 

Q was easy to predict in some ways, which made her difficult to predict in others. Q—her full name was hidden and seemed forgotten by every system in the world—did precisely what she wanted, when she wanted. Rather than Bond’s flashier, grittier refusal to comply with orders, Q simply sidestepped them. Bond had rarely seen Q get into an argument. If she didn’t like something, she circumvented it or ignored it until things went her way once again. She was a queen at manipulating systems, which was what had gotten her the job as Quartermaster in the first place. 

To Bond, it was as if the woman had appeared out of nowhere. She was younger than Bond, gorgeous, blonde, and delicate in appearance. In a glance, Bond had written her off as harmless. It seemed that most people did so. Q rarely argued—but she did make them pay later. 

By the time Bond had realized what was happening, Q was in charge of her department and had secured a top position at MI6. 

At first, Bond had spent time with the other woman out of curiosity. It wasn’t often she misjudged people so thoroughly, and she wanted to solve Q and put the mystery behind her. Instead, she’d found herself enthralled. 

Bond could always trust Q to do exactly what she wanted, which meant Bond never quite knew what she’d do next. The woman’s soft features were belied by a mischievous smirk and a biting wit. The hacker didn’t care one whit that Bond was one of the greatest secret agents in the world, didn’t care how many men she had killed, or how many failed missions were behind her. She laughed when Bond acted mysterious, rolled her eyes when Bond was threatening, and sighed when Bond invaded her space. 

No, it hadn’t taken long at all for Bond to realize that she was smitten with her new Quartermaster. 

The morning after her impromptu crash at Q’s flat, she woke up to find Q sitting on a nearby armchair, sipping a cup of tea while her other hand darted across her laptop’s keys. The woman looked settled in, which meant Bond had continued sleeping once she’d entered and hadn’t stirred even as she sat down. 

Rolling over, Bond realized that the light streaming through the windows was made artificially gray by a heavy rain and that, according the clock on one of Q’s many electronic systems, it was nearly two in the afternoon. 

“Ah, Sleeping Beauty awakens,” Q commented. “If I hadn’t reviewed your records myself, I might have thought you had a concussion.”

Bond grumbled and shoved her face back into the colorful pillow she’d mocked the night before. 

“I have to head out in a bit. Trouble at the office, you know how it is. Can’t survive without me for even a day.”

Bond’s eyes jolted open when there was a metallic click on the coffee table in front of her. A brass key had landed next to her. 

“Next time,” Q said. “Use the front door.”

***

Surprisingly, there was a next time. And another. And another. 

By the fourth time, Bond stopped feeling like she was getting away with something by managing to drop by without Q kicking her out, and instead started to wonder why Q was letting her stick around. A thick quilt had been added to the jumbled décor of the living room for Bond’s visits, giving tacit approval to the way most of her visits ended with Bond sleeping on the couch while Q worked.

Bond knew her strengths. She was tough as nails, made the right decisions in urgent situations, and could hold her breath for nearly five minutes. Outside of work, Q didn't need her for any of that. There were no enemies to incapacitate that Q's security system wouldn't take care of just as easily, even if anyone tried to target the flat. 

The answer, once she thought about it, was obvious. 

People who didn't need Bond for her skills against people were interested in what she could do for people. 

One evening, Bond left MI6 a few hours before she knew Q was going to be able to escape her duties. 004 had found himself in a clusterfuck of a situation in Montenegro, and Q was needed to get him out. Bond, having just returned two days earlier from an easy mission in Brazil, had been given leave for the next few days. 

After stopping by the store for supplies, Bond set up in Q's kitchen. Once everything was in motion, she changed into a slinky black dress that accentuated her curves while drawing attention away from her scars. She pulled her hair up into a high ponytail that swished when she walked, and added a touch of dark lipstick to complete the look. Leaving her shoes off to give the ensemble a casual feel, Bond came back into the kitchen right when the front door opened. 

There was a series of beeps while Q armed the front door. "What is that smell?" she called. 

"Roast and potatoes," Bond replied. 

"What's the occasion?" Q asked, coming into the kitchen. She stopped at the door, looking around in shock. There were candles lit on the small kitchen table between two full sets of dinnerware. 

In sharp contrast to Bond, Q was wearing a slouchy, oversized sweater, tight trousers, and sensible shoes. Her hair was in a messy bun, and her eyes were bloodshot behind her glasses. 

"I just felt like doing something special tonight," Bond said with a slow smile. "It's been a long week, hasn't it?"

"It has," Q agreed, still looking around the room. "Where the bloody hell did you find all this? Not in my cabinets, surely."

"I went out and picked up a few things," Bond said. When Q didn't say anything else, she added, "Not everyone can live off paper plates and plastic cutlery."

"I don't use plastic.... God, that smells fantastic," Q said when Bond opened the oven door. 

Bond set the roast in the middle of the table so that the candles artistically surrounded it. "I know how to do more than pull a trigger, you know."

"I know." Q’s voice was faint, still clearly in shock.

Even when they sat down to eat, though, the conversation was the most stilted they'd ever had. No matter how fascinated and alluring Bond tried to be, Q just spent the entire meal acting vaguely confused. 

Finally, Bond asked, "Is 004 all right?"

"004? Yes, he's fine. A few grazes, a broken ankle-- all in all, far better than expected," Q said, finally focusing on their conversation. "The whole situation put some of your exploits to shame."

"Now, I doubt that," she replied with a smile. "You seem tense. More wine?"

"Sure," Q said. "Hell, after today, I'm almost craving that scotch you love so much."

"You're not supposed to drink expensive scotch to drown your sorrows," Bond pointed out, standing to get the bottle of red she'd selected. "It's far too rare for that."

Q laughed. "Is this one of those 'do as I say, not as I do' lessons? Because I remember you using a bottle as a field disinfectant."

Bond topped Q's glass and then rested her hands on Q's shoulders. "Hm, you are tense," Bond said. 

"Bond," Q said flatly. 

"Yes?" She gave Q's shoulders a gentle squeeze. 

"Bond," Q tried again. "Are you seducing me?"

"Why?" Bond asked, leaning to murmur in Q's ear. "Is it working?"

"Not so much," Q said, battling Bond's hands away and turning in her chair. "What the bloody hell?"

"What? We're both consenting, attractive adults. It's okay to want this," Bond told her. 

Q's face turned red. "I repeat, what the hell?" she demanded. 

Finally realizing things were not going to plan at all, Bond stepped back. " I'm not going to hurt you," she said, raising her hands to show she wasn't a threat. " I was just trying to make you feel good."

"You're treating me like a bloody mark," Q snapped. "You don't think I've seen you seduce people enough times to recognize your frankly blunt moves when they're turned on me?"

"They're blunt because most people like to be deliberately seduced," Bond said. 

"I don't want to be seduced at all," Q said. "Especially not by you."

"Is this a pride thing?" Bond asked. "I'll have you know that a lot of people have had sex with me. I've been told I'm the best lay in the Western Hemisphere. It's not going to ruin your reputation."

"Exactly, 007," Q said. "You've slept with the whole damn planet."

"So it's because I'm a slag," Bond concluded. 

"Bond, if you don't sit your arse down right now and stop interrupting, I really will throw you out that door."

Too surprised to do anything but, Bond sat.

"Now, I'm trying very hard not to slap you right now, so give me a second," Q said, putting a hand to her temples. "Let's get this clear. I'm your Quartermaster. Not a notch in your bedpost. I've had enough of our colleagues attempt this sort of thing to know that apparently you all think I'm easy, or that because I like computers I must be desperate for it. That is not the case."

"That's not what I thought at all," Bond interrupted. 

Q raised an eyebrow, letting it speak for her. It was surprisingly eloquent. 

"I promise, I respect you entirely," Bond said. "I wasn't trying to offend you."

Q looked her over, taking in the whole ensemble with a critical eye. Bond felt like a string of bad code about to be eliminated by the Quartermaster. "No, I don't think you were," she said softly, "and that's even worse. You thought this was what I wanted."

"Isn't it?" Bond challenged, crossing her arms. She knew the effect it had on her figure. "Come on, Q."

Q shook her head. "I don't need nor want to be seduced in order to be convinced to let you stay here a few nights. Honestly, I can't decide if I'm sad or offended that you thought that."

"That's not what I..."

Q quelled her with a sharp look. "I'm not one of your marks. Don't try to trick me into giving you want you want. I don't like to be manipulated. There's enough of that on the job-- I don't want to deal with it in my own flat."

It was clear Bond had lost control of the situation. "I wasn't trying to take advantage of you."

"No," Q agreed. "I think it was just the opposite."

"Well, I think you've made your answer clear." Bond stood up, smoothing out the wrinkles in her dress and adjusting her watch. She continued, focusing on making her tone less stilted, "There's cheesecake in the fridge. You should try it out when you're hungry again."

"Oh, do sit down, Bond," Q instructed. 

Bond stayed standing, ready to head for the door. "I don't want to make you uncomfortable, Q, no matter what you've heard about me."

"What, you can't be friends with someone you're not shagging?" Q asked. She shook her head. "I'm turning down your offer for sex, not you personally. Besides, you shouldn't let me eat that cheesecake alone. If it's anything as good as the rest of what you made, then I'm not sure I'll be able to resist eating it all."

Bond sat back down across from the blonde, giving her an assessing look. None of this was going as she'd anticipated, and it was disconcerting. "You don't want to sleep with me, but you want me to stay?" she confirmed. 

"Precisely," Q said. "More wine?" 

Bond leaned back in her seat, nodding. "Please."

***

Over the years, Bond had grown proficient at every weapon she'd ever been handed. She knew the quirks and potential issues with each gun she might need to use, and could accommodate them into her planning instantly. 

Still, even all of her training couldn't help her when the entire situation was this unusual. 

Bond was on a jet ski, skipping over the waves created by the yacht she was pursuing. The vessel belonged to a drug cartel that had begun experimenting in human trafficking, and Bond only had three minutes to take them out before they hit international waters. 

According to their intel, there were no hostages on the ship, so Bond had license to use lethal force. She would have happily take advantage of that if she could manage the shot. Between the harsh jolts of her jet ski and the ocean spray blurring her vision, Bond was having trouble finding a weak spot on the yacht to hit. The men on board had spotted her a few minutes earlier, so Bond was left dodging bullet as she got closer to the boat. 

"Bond, do you read?" Q's voice was calm over the comms, and clear despite the spraying water and whipping wind. 

"I'm here," Bond replied, wiping her eyes with her forearm and readjusting her aim. There was supposed to be a marker over the fuel tank on this side of the yacht. She narrowed her eyes, wondering if age was making her vision unclear, and when another shot rang out overhead. "Shit."

"Bond? Come in," Q said. "Are you hurt?"

"Just a graze," Bond said, gritting her teeth. Adrenaline was helping her focus, but she knew the hole in her shoulder would need some stitches. A few more hits like that, Bond wouldn't even be able to handle a Glock. "I see the fuel tank."

"Don't take it," Q instructed. She was typing so loudly that even Bond could hear it. 

"I have the shot!"

"Abort," Q snapped back. "Abandon your vessel. Jump now."

It would take seconds for Bond to make the shot and put an end to the smuggling ring forever. Over the years, Bond had learned to trust her own instincts. No matter how smart her Quartermasters were, they didn't know what it was like to be in the field. However, Q had never led her astray before. 

Bond jerked off the Velcro strap connecting her to the jet ski and then dove sideways off the vehicle, hitting the water at such a fast speed that she lost her breath. The collision sent a jolt of pain through her injured shoulder so strong that she nearly lost consciousness. Without a life vest to keep her afloat, though, Bond would be lost to the ocean the moment she blacked out. 

Breaking the surface and kicking her legs to keep her in place, Bond cleared the water and hair out of her eyes just in time to watch the yacht explode. She ducked back under the water to avoid the flying debris, and then surfaced again a few moments later. 

"What the hell?" Bond asked breathlessly. 

"There was an abandoned minefield at the international border," Q explained. "I was able to hack in and activate it. Remind me to never work with ancient tech again. It was like carving into a stone tablet."

"You couldn't have let me know earlier?" Bond asked. "You know, in a way that wouldn't leave me stranded in the middle of the Channel?"

"Coast guard will pick you up in fifteen," Q assured her. "I wasn't sure I would be able to make the mines function. You were still our first line of defense." There was a pause on the line. "You didn't ask why I needed you to jump."

"Well, it's a good thing I did, isn't it? Or you'd have blown me to smithereens." A sharp pulse of pain in her arm made Bond lose her rhythm treading the surface. Her head fell below the surface, but she managed to make her way back up before she swallowed any water. "There aren't any sharks here, right?"

"Not usually," Q said. "The ones that aren't won't attack you unless you do something that makes them come investigate."

Bond looked at the dark blood swirling in the water around her and frowned. "You might want to ask the coast guard if they can hurry."

Within five minutes, Bond was bundled in a thick blanket on the lower deck of a coast guard vessel. Q stayed in her ear for the whole journey back to land. 

***

"Are you kidding me?" Q shouted, voice shrill. "Are you actually bloody kidding me?"

"Relax," Bond said, clapping her hands to get rid of excess flour. "It won't take that long to clean up." She was baking chocolate chip cookies from scratch. The counters may have been covered in ingredients and broken eggshells, but Bond had it on good authority that her cookies were worth it. 

On second thought, that might have been an innuendo...

"I'm not talking about the damn flour," Q said. "You're supposed to be in Medical!"

"Oh," Bond said. "Right. Well, I already went by and got patched up."

Q dropped her briefcase on a clear patch of counter and adjusted her glasses. "I checked your chart before I left. They wanted to keep you on an IV drip overnight, as well as running some more tests to make sure you didn't break anything with your dive earlier. Not to mention the fact that you swallowed a fair bit of the ocean."

"You say that like jumping off a speeding jet-ski was my idea," Bond retorted. "I'm fine, Q."

Q scoffed. "Like I'd trust your judgment."

"Then trust this. You can kick me out of your kitchen, but I'm not going back to Medical." Bond knew--she knew-- that the doctors on staff at MI6 were just trying to help her. It was just that the walls and smell and needles that made her want to make a run for it. She'd been the subject of enough interrogations and experiments that she'd rather end up dry-drowning than sitting in those white rooms for another minute. 

Q shook her head, but Bond could see in her stance that she was going to concede. "Fine. You don't have to go. At least you're safe here instead of passing out on a bar stool somewhere. Also because those cookies smell bloody fabulous."

"You're so noble," Bond said, rolling her eyes and returning to her baking. 

"I'm glad you're all right," Q added quietly, but she was gone when Bond turned back around. 

***

"My house has been unusually peaceful lately," M said. 

They were in his office at his request. Bond was busy staring at the bulldog on his desk and thinking of ways to 'accidentally' destroy it. "What, did you finally have those loud neighbors killed? I'd rather think that's an abuse of power, but I won't tell."

"I just had an official warning dropped on their doorstep," M said. "I was talking about you. Rumor has it that you have a new favourite haunt."

Bond grinned lazily. "Why, M, I didn't realize you were such a busybody," she said. 

"I'm in the spy business, Miss Bond. Gossip is my livelihood," M said seriously. He had his hands folded on his desk, and an outside would have assumed he was being serious. Luckily, Bond had known him long enough to read his tells. 

"So what's the talk?"

"It has been implied that Q has a new bedmate," M said. "You've been seen around her department more often than ever, and the codes to your apartment haven't been touched in days. If you're not at my flat, then you're with her."

"Maybe I made a new friend," Bond challenged. 

M scoffed. "Funny. You haven't dipped outside the spy game in years, and there aren't any foreign nationals in town worth catching your attention. Besides, apparently Q talks to herself while she works."

"What--"

"Let me finish," M said. "I don't care who you shag. Just don't let it interfere with business. You weren't in the country for her recruitment process, but let me tell you-- she's more vindictive than she looks." 

"We're not shagging," Bond said crisply. 

M looked at her skeptically, and then his eyebrows lifted in surprise. "Oh no," he said. 

"What?" Bond asked. 

"This is even worse. You're pining."

"I am not," she replied haughtily. 

"Are too. God, I never thought I'd see the day," he said, shaking his head. 

Bond stopped trying to deny it. M had been playing the game far longer than she had, and was ace at reading people. "She's intriguing," she said. 

M held a hand up. "I'm not getting involved in this," he said. "If you start shagging, don't forget to file the fraternization forms. MI6 isn't going to try to stop you two, but it needs to be on file."

"It's not going to happen," Bond said. "She's not interested."

M snorted. "Definitely pining," he said. 

***

Throughout her life, Bond had dealt with the issues that came from having a British father and a Chinese mother. With her bland, cultured accent and paler skin, she was often ignored by the Asian cliques at her prep schools. Her dark hair and slanted eyes, though, brought on teasing from the white kids. 

Becoming an agent, though, meant Bond got to turn those stereotypes into a weapon. She could play innocent, seductive, exotic-- whatever was needed. It made her a valuable asset. 

One side-effect of her features, though, was that she ended up being sent to Asia for missions no one else would be able to complete. After traveling that part of the world so often, Bond had developed a taste for food that could burn her tongue off. 

Q, on the other hand, was English to her core. She was perfectly content with beans and toast for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. If it weren't for Bond cooking when she was staying over, the blonde woman would likely have never tried anything that didn't come out of a tin. 

Still, Bond hadn't quite expected the other woman's reaction when she tried Bond's pineapple fried rice. 

Her eyes went wide, pale skin splotching red almost instantaneously, and she waved a hand frantically in front of her mouth. After a moment of silent laughter, Bond nudged her glass of milk over to Q to drink. "What the bloody hell did you put in this?" Q asked after downing half the glass. 

"I made it as mild as I could without ruining the whole recipe," Bond said, unable to suppress a smile. 

Q shook her head, taking another gulp of milk. "This isn't mild," she argued. 

"Maybe not by British standards," Bond conceded. "I thought you would appreciate the authenticity."

"I mean, it wasn't disgusting," Q said. "But look at me! I'm not meant for spice," she continued, gesturing to her face. The redness was fading from her skin, but her eyes were still watering behind her glasses.

Bond still thought she looked gorgeous. 

"I promise not to laugh if you want to keep eating," Bond assured her. 

"You're already laughing," Q pointed out, but she was smiling. "Where did you even learn to cook like this?"

"One summer, I got stranded after a mission in Thailand for more than a month. It was their heavy rain season, and there was no transport available that wouldn't draw the attention of some very angry government officials. I bought a little bungalow in the jungle, but ended up spending a fair bit of time in town. Finally, I guess they decided I'd spend enough time sitting in the main restaurant that they decided to put me to work in the kitchen. Honestly, you're lucky I changed the recipe. The way they made it had so many spices that it was like eating fire... with a touch of chicken and peanuts."

"You must have a gut of steel after everything you must have eaten abroad," Q said. 

Bond nodded. "There isn't much use for a double-oh with a weak constitution." she agreed. "If you can't resist Thai cooking, there's not much of a chance you can withstand waterboarding."

The smile evaporated from Q's face. 

"Sorry," Bond said hesitantly. "Agent humour."

"You know, I decided to work for the government because I wanted to keep people safe. I thought that I could use code and fancy tricks to keep people out of harm's way. Instead, I've ended up using you and the other double-ohs for some of the most dangerous missions." Q swirled the liquid in her wine glass as she spoke, avoiding Bond's eyes.

"I knew what I was signing up for," Bond said. 

"Did you really?" Q challenged.

Bond thought back on everything she'd done and had done to her over the past few decades. Could she ever have imagined how much pain she would go through when she had first signed up? "No," she admitted. "But I would have done it anyway."

"Why?"

"Queen and Country," Bond replied immediately. With a shrug, she added, "Besides, I've saved thousands, if not millions, of lives. What am I compared to that?"

Q wasn't convinced. "Someone else could have done it."

"No, they couldn't have," Bond said. "And that's not ego-- it's fact. No one else can do what I do. I wouldn't trust the fate of the world to anyone else. I'm in this job until it kills me." 

"You trust me," Q pointed out quietly. 

Bond was stopped short, but finally nodded. "I do. But that doesn't mean I would let you do my job," she said. 

Q shook her head and took a sip of her wine. "Jamie Bond. The best secret agent in England, and she doesn't even realize how valuable she is."

"I know how good an agent I am," Bond replied, but Q just sighed. 

"Exactly," she said.

***

Bond had one goal for the evening. As countless terrorists had learned over the years, when Bond set her mind to something, it inevitably happened. She possessed a combination of recklessness and stubbornness that made her a dangerous adversary. 

Tonight, though, there was no adversary in her way.

London was full of places to meet other singles: swanky cocktail bars, intimate coffee shops, and everything in between. On the rare occasion Bond went out during her personal time, it was to a private club she had gained admission to years ago. There was a formal dress code, and it was strictly invite-only. 

Spending so much time at Q's cluttered flat had made Bond lose some of her comfort with such stiff formality. Instead of donning a suit tonight, Bond was in a pair of black jeans and a silk top. The ensemble left minimal room for weapons, but Bond was reasonably confident she would be the most dangerous person in any room she ended up in, no matter how impaired she got. 

Edmund's was a dive bar near Piccadilly Circus. Though it was quieter than the crowds outside, the smoky room was still full of the sounds of clacking pool balls and loud conversations. 

Bond leaned against the bar, a scotch in hand, and scoped out the room. 

It had been years since Bond had felt real attraction with someone. After Vesper's death, Bond had assumed she had lost the ability. Even with Vesper, Bond hadn't been entirely honest. She had offered to give up the spy game, but she would never be able to get England out of her bones. 

Q, though, knew Bond better than anyone ever had. She was undoubtedly the best friend Bond had ever had. That should have been enough, but Bond couldn't get the idea of more out of her mind. 

The fact was that after Q had turned her down, she had realized how much she had wanted it. Not the staged seduction she had attempted, but a genuine romantic relationship with her Quartermaster. 

However, Q had turned her down, and Bond was woman enough to accept that. Q wasn't a mark-- just because Bond could have seduced her didn't mean that she should. Bond was left with two choices: ignore the tension, or fuck the Quartermaster out of her system.

Never let it be said that Bond was one to mope over her failures.

It didn't take long for Bond to select her target. The man in the corner had thick brown hair and dark eyes, making him the perfect contrast to the woman dogging Bond's thoughts. Taking another sip of her drink, Bond looked at the man through her lashes, keeping eye contact when he glanced in her direction a third time.

He murmured something to his pool partner, picked up his drink from a nearby stool and then headed Bond's way. She let a smirk grow on her face. Q or not, Bond still had it.

***

The man had a flat just a block away, and Bond let herself be led up a narrow set of stairs to his cramped studio. He kissed like he knew how, and didn't seem to care any more to learn her name than she did to learn his. 

Bond's phone beeped in her pocket, but she ignored it as the man pressed her against the door and stripped her shirt over her head. 

He kissed a line down her neck and then used his teeth to pull down one of her bra straps. 

Leaning her head back, Bond grinned to herself. This was exactly what she needed. 

Her phone buzzed again in her pocket, this time emitting the bouncy pop tune she had set as Q's ringtone. She sighed, straightening up. 

"Turn it off," the man murmured against her collarbone. 

She shook her head. "I need to get this. Give me a second."

He hesitated, and then stepped back. "Want a beer?" he asked, moving toward the flat's small kitchen. 

She nodded before turning and taking the phone out of her pocket. Catching the call on its last ring, she said, "This is Bond." The man was leaning over to collect the beer bottles from the fridge, giving her a nice view of his ass. 

"Bond? It's, ah, it's Q."

"What's wrong?" she asked immediately. 

There was a rush of static as Q sighed into the phone. "Sorry, I just-- Are you coming home tonight? Here, I mean?"

"I..."

The man turned around, eyebrows raised. She waved for him to give her another moment. 

"Oh, you're busy. Of course," Q said. "Sorry, sorry, just go back to whatever you were doing."

"Are you okay?" Bond asked, pulling her bra strap back into place. 

"Yeah, yeah, I'm fine. It's... I don't know why I called," she said. "We just, well, there was an awful mission today. I guess I'm just shaken."

"I'll be home in fifteen," Bond told her. 

Hanging up, Bond knelt and picked up her shirt where it had been thrown on the floor. 

"Let me guess," the man said, making Bond look over at him. He was leaning against the wall, a beer in each hand. "You've got to run?"

She nodded, sweeping her hair into a ponytail. "Sorry."

He shrugged. "If you're running back that easily, you shouldn't have tried to cheat in the first place."

"We're not together," she told him. She realized she had been fiddling with the phone in her hand, so she stuck it in her pocket. "It's just a friend."

"Sure."

Bond shot an annoyed glance at him. "You don't know what you're talking about."

The man hummed skeptically. "If it doesn't work out, you know where to find me."

***

Even if Q's flat hadn't been London's usual shoebox size, it wouldn't have been hard to find the woman. Bond followed the smell of sharp alcohol and the sound of clacking keys to the living room. Q was sitting on the couch wrapped in one of her plush quilts while she drank whiskey from the bottle. When she heard Bond enter, she looked up. Her eyes were rimmed with red, and her face was flushed. "This," she said, waving the bottle at Bond, "is disgusting."

"Cheap whiskey is supposed to be disgusting," Bond said. "It's a punishment for skimping on the price. I thought you hated hard liquor?" 

Q sighed. "I do. I needed something that could get me drunk fast." She took another quick gulp of the drink, and then said, "I could have saved him."

"Okay, you definitely shouldn't be drinking cheap whiskey right now," Bond said, plucking the bottle from the other woman's grasp.

"You are such a bleeding hypocrite," Q said. "I'll have you know that this is the perfect time to drink." Ignoring her protests, Bond put the whiskey on another table and then pulled out the bottle of Glenfiddich from where she'd stored it in the back of a china cabinet. When she set it down on the table in front of Q, the woman blinked. "I thought you said not to, what was it, 'drown my sorrows in nice scotch?'"

"I'm not letting you drink alone, and I'd rather not choke down that swill you bought at the corner store," Bond said. She sat down on the couch beside Q.

Q picked up the bottle and then uncapped it. "I'm still not using a glass," she warned Bond. 

Bond shrugged, leaning back on the couch. "I don't have cooties," she assured her.

They passed the bottle back and forth in silence for a while. Bond let the scotch warm her veins. She hadn't had much at the bar, since she wanted to stay sharp enough to snare her hook-up. Even though she had a gut of steel, enough swigs of whiskey were enough for Bond to feel the effects in her limbs, if not in her mind.

She let her head loll back on the couch, wondering at the fact that she had started the night with the goal to get Q out of her head, and had somehow instead ended up getting drunk with the woman. 

"Did I, ah, pull you away from something important?" Q asked, voice oddly tight. 

"Nah," Bond said, waving a hand dismissively. When Q didn't answer, she glanced over, "Why?"

"Your neck says differently," Q pointed out. 

Bond felt at her neck for a confused moment before remembering the bite marks that had been dropped in a line there. "Oh yeah," she said. "Like I said, not really important."

"You didn't have to come," Q said. "You saw the report. I fucked up-- I should be drinking alone."

"I didn't see a report," Bond said. "What happened?"

"You didn't hear that one of the junior agents got killed today?" Q asked. "I assumed you knew. You didn't ask why I wanted you to come home." 

Bond blinked. "You asked me to," she reminded her. 

Q was visibly thrown for a moment, and then she took another gulp of scotch, wincing as she swallowed. "Did you know Rick Moorhouse?"

Shaking her head, Bond admitted, "I never work much with the newer recruits."

"Well, you won't get the chance now. He's dead. Maybe it hasn't gotten around your level yet. I guess you'd have found out tomorrow anyway. Of course, I've been sent home for the weekend. Tanner told me to take some time to myself, but I know what he was thinking. They don't know if they can trust me."

"What happened?" Bond asked. She leaned sideways against the couch back, extending her leg so that it brushed against Q's, lending her some subtle support. 

"Bad intel," Q said. "There was way more support than we'd expected. It wasn't supposed to be a difficult mission. By the time they called me in, everything was a clusterfuck." Q closed her eyes. "We almost got him out. We were so close. Then he got trapped in this hallway and couldn't figure out which door to take. He just kept asking me what to do. I was just... We were flying blind. I thought he'd be safe where I sent him, but when he opened the door... Well, I'm sure you know what it sounds like. Hearing someone die."

Bond nodded, but didn't add anything else. 

Q's eyes were still closed. "I should have known to send him to the other door. Of course they were coming at him from the stairs. Hell, he might have been safer jumping out the window. Instead, I led him right to them." 

Bond waited for her to continue, but she seemed done. "You're blaming yourself," Bond said. 

"No wonder they call you the best agent in the world," Q murmured without looking at her. 

"Look, Q, I'm all for wallowing when it's deserved, but this wasn't your fault,"she said. "You weren't even on the comms until things went tits up. Sometimes when you get handed a grenade with the pin pulled, all you can do is delay the inevitable."

"But he trusted me," Q said. Her voice broke as she spoke, and Bond realized that there were tears glimmering under her eyelashes.

Bond was so used to Q being level-headed that it took her until then to realize that she wasn't approaching the situation like a seasoned agent. For all of her tricks and talents, Q was still green in the harsher realities of fieldwork. She could press the button to have people killed, but losing someone's whose life was in your hands was beyond her realm of understanding. 

She wasn't looking for logic. She would find that in the morning once the shock started to fade. Q was too rational to let one bad mission keep her down for long. Tonight, though, she needed to grieve, not to talk through things. Bond took the bottle out of Q's hand and put it on the table. When Q opened her eyes, blinking away tears, Bond leaned forward to hug her. 

Casual hugs were not something Bond was well-versed in. Fatal chokeholds and seductive embraces were muscle memory, but simply sharing space with someone wasn't normal for her. When Q practically melted in her arms, pressing her face into Bond's neck, she decided that it was nice to use her body for something other than seduction and assassination. 

Q's slender body trembled in her arms as Bond rubbed a hand in soothing circles on her back. "I'm sorry, love," Bond said softly. 

Most people needed Bond because of something she was. M needed his best agent. She found a way to make herself useful to her targets so she could slip through their defenses. Q, though, hadn't called her because she needed someone killed or information extracted. She had wanted a friend, and her first thought had been to call Bond. Q cared about Bond as a person first, then as an agent second. 

Bond should have known it was all too good to be true. 

Q pulled back slightly, looking at Bond with watery eyes, and then leaned forward to press their lips together. 

Q's lips were soft yet demanding, coaxing Bond to hold her tighter and match her movements. The kiss deepened quickly, and Bond quickly found herself being pulled down onto the couch with the other woman stretched out beneath her. 

Q grabbed the hem of Bond's shirt and began lifting it. The movement reminded Bond of the man she'd nearly slept with earlier and jolted her back to her senses. 

Pulling back slightly, Bond looked down at Q. The blonde was breathing heavily, staring up at Bond with hooded eyes. Her eyes were still red from crying. "What?" Q asked softly, hand still tracing up Bond's side. 

Bond sighed and sat up, pulling her shirt back into place and moving off Q. 

Q propped herself up on her elbows and declared, "You stopped."

"I did," Bond agreed, running a hand through her hair and gathering it over her shoulder. Q had pulled her ponytail loose at some point. "You're drunk."

"Yes, I am indeed. Jolly good deduction, Sherlock." Q snapped her fingers, the sound a lazy note in the quiet room. "Now get back on top of me. That was nice."

Bond shook her head. "You should get some sleep," she said.

Q pouted, testing Bond's resolve. "Why are you doing this? Do you not want to?"

"It's not about what I want," Bond said. "You've gone through enough today. I don't want you to regret this."

"I won't," Q insisted, leaning forward to kiss her again, but Bond moved away. "You're serious? I can make my own decisions, Bond." She gesticulated loosely as she spoke, contradicting her argument. "If you don't want to shag me, just say so. But I know you get drunk and do dumb things all the time."

"Yeah," Bond agreed. "I do. I live with those mistakes. I have too many to count, anyway. But I don't want to be one of your mistakes, Q. I... I'd rather be more than that."

Q flopped back onto the couch. "You're an idiot," she complained. 

Bond winced. "So I've heard. Come on, let's get you to bed."

Q let herself be ushered into her room and, despite her protests, fell asleep almost as soon as her head hit the pillow. Bond stood in the threshold, watching the blonde sleep. 

It wasn't often that Bond felt the need to do the noble thing. Q hadn't wanted her, though-- not really. She'd made her opinion of sleeping with Bond quite clear the first time she'd been propositioned. 

Funny. She'd always expected it'd feel good to do the right thing. 

*** 

Dress hiked around her waist, Bond splashed whiskey on the gash on the front of her thigh, hissing when the alcohol stung. If she hadn't lost her comm around the time her target had bashed her over the head with a chair, she could have made a disparaging remark about the actual best use for cheap whiskey. As it was, she just gritted her teeth and rode through the fresh wave of pain. 

The night Q had kissed her, Bond had stayed on the couch to make sure she stayed safe. The next morning when she heard Q stumble to the loo, Bond had slipped out. 

In the aftermath of Q's junior agent's death, the situation in Mumbai was volatile. Things had escalated more quickly than anticipated, so higher-ups decided to send a double-oh to clean up. 

If Bond had agreed to her assignment more eagerly than usual, only M raised an eyebrow. 

From the moment Bond slipped through the border, the mission was hell. What MI6 had believed to be a minor drug manufacturer had ended up with ties to every corrupt politician in the area, as well as several abroad. The product that had been surfacing in Great Britain had gone through an enormous international smuggling ring. 

The mission had taken Bond around the globe, and she had just completed her final objective, taking out the kingpin that was organizing it all. She was left without her gun, comm, passport, and shoes; all she still had was a roll of cash stuffed in her bra, taken off the man lying dead in the hotel room a few miles back, and her torn dress. Luckily, the dirty motel she had just checked into hadn’t asked any questions once she’d slapped a stack of bills on the counter, and she had been able to find an abandoned sewing kit in the closet. After sterilizing the needle, she set to work stitching up her thigh. 

Mission protocol stated that her next course of action should be to call one of MI6’s burner phone numbers to report that she had achieved her goal and was ready for evac. The fact of it was, though, she was tired. Exhausted to her core. The thought of going back to MI6, facing Q after their uncomfortable encounter the other night, was overwhelming. She just... 

First, she needed to make sure she wasn’t going to bleed out or get an infection. She let the steady poke and pull of the needle distract her from the uncertainty in her head. Everything else could wait. 

***

In the end, Bond didn’t call MI6. The bodies left in her wake would be enough to let them know that the mission was complete, and the chip feeding back her vitals to HQ would let M know she was alive. After the mission she’d just gone through, she had earned some time off. 

Even without her passport, it hadn’t taken Bond long to make her way from Bhutan to Thailand. Within a few days of completing her mission, she was sequestered away in one of her safe houses around the world: the small bungalow she had purchased the first time she’d been stranded in the country. The jungle had begun reclaiming the small house, but Bond had hacked away the worst of the infringing greenery, lit the fireplace to keep away any animals, and settled in. 

The medical supplies she’d purchased on her way in were simple, but functional. She put herself on a run of antibiotics and kept her makeshift stitches clean, as well as using the bandages to keep some of her other wounds clean. The cut on her thigh was the only one that would leave a scar, but it was healing decently. 

She visited the nearby village a few times, and was surprised when she was recognized almost immediately. Apparently the town didn't get many visitors, especially not British women who tended to show up covered in bruises. 

Though she had brought as many bottles of rice wine as she could carry back to her bungalow as she could carry, along with all the nonperishable food she could find, by the end of the week, she was running low.

There wasn't much to do in the jungle besides lick her wounds and drink away her nightmares. 

After a week in seclusion, Bond started to wonder if she'd be better off staying there for the rest of her days. She could extract and destroy her vitals-tracking chip so no one would even know to come looking for her. A few people might regret her apparent death, but they'd get over it. She had earned her retirement by now, and would almost certainly be able to find a way to ferret her savings to a new identity. 

Bond simply couldn't take the idea of returning to London and not having Q waiting for her. 

She hadn't been able to stop thinking about that night. What had she been thinking, confessing her feelings? She should have known that Q would scoff. Bond was a good shag, but no one would seriously consider her as having romantic potential. It wasn't that Bond was taking the coward's way out. Q had made her stance quite clear. Bond was stuck deciding the best way to move forward. 

She should have gone through with fucking the Quartermaster out of her system and left it at that. 

Though her bungalow was deep in the wilderness and virtually untraceable, she had set up a number of security measures in the vicinity. Technology wouldn't be able to survive in the jungle's thick humidity, so Bond had gone more low-tech. 

When a bell rang in the distance to signal that she'd caught an interloper, Bond didn't bother to suppress her groan. Retirement was already getting boring-- she could use a wayward thief or assassin to liven things up. Unfortunately, the only thing her traps had yielded thus far was an irate wild hog. 

Shouldering the machete she'd been using to hack away at the surrounding greenery, Bond trekked through the jungle toward the tripped trap. 

When she got closer, she realized that the hanging net was holding something decidedly human. The prisoner was swearing viciously in a familiar voice. 

Bond stood under the trap, looking up at the struggling figure. "A little far from home, aren't you?" she called. 

Q twisted so she could peer down at Bond through the thick ropes. "Please tell me this contraption is your doing and we're not about to have to run somewhere," she said, voice muffled by the fact her cheek was smashed against one of the ropes. 

"It's mine," Bond said. "Stay still." Carefully, she cut through the rope keeping the trap suspended and lowered Q to the jungle floor.

Bond had to bite her tongue to stop herself from laughing when Q got to her feet, dusting dirt off her clothes. She was dressed in olive green fatigues and a floppy hat, complete with a bug net, though it was thankfully tucked away. Though Bond could smell her layers of sunscreen and bug spray from feet away, her cheeks were pink from the sun. 

She looked awful. Bond wanted her so badly that it caused a physical twinge in her side. 

"How barbaric. You couldn't have just installed a security camera?" Q asked. 

"What are you doing here?" Bond returned, ignoring the question. 

Q readjusted her hat, though it made no difference. A chunk of blonde hair slipped free and dangled over her shoulder. "You weren't that hard to track, even though you...misplaced your comm set and accompanying satellite tracker. You know how much money goes into each of those, by the way."

"Never cared to learn," Bond admitted dryly. "Keeping track of it wasn't my top priority at the time. There were a few people trying to kill me."

"Are you okay?" Q asked, her gaze darting iced Bond's body again. She had tossed the shredded dress from the mission and replaced it with sturdy linens from town. 

"Fine," Bond said. A cracking tree branch drew her attention away from the Quartermaster for a moment. She didn't spot anything in the surrounding woods, but that didn't mean much. The best predators stayed hidden until they were in striking distance. "Let's talk inside."

If Bond deliberately took one of the more difficult paths back to her bungalow just to hear Q cursing under her breath, no one else had to know. 

Once they were inside, Bond shoved a water bottle at Q and said, "Now, want to tell me why you're here?"

The shack was smaller than even most studio flats in London, with none of the amenities. Bond's bed was tucked in one corner, a run-down kitchen took up the opposite end, and only a small rickety table and a pair of foldable chairs offered seating. Q took off her hat and sat, revealing mussed hair. She accepted the water bottle and cracked it open, drinking nearly half of it in one go. Once she was done, she said, "You disappeared."

Bond nodded, leaning against the wall and waiting. Sitting down would have put them too close. Bond needed distance for this. 

"Well, we couldn't just leave you."

Raising an eyebrow, Bond pointed out, "If MI6 wanted to find me, they would have sent a team, not one of their most valuable desk jockeys."

"So I might have volunteered," Q said. "And taken some vacation days. It took me almost a week to follow your trail. When you go off the grid, you don't it half-heartedly."

Bond shook her head, tired of the conversation. "That's because I didn't want to be followed. What do you need?"

Q sighed. "I didn't want to leave things the way we did."

"Guilt, then."

"I'd almost forgotten what a bloody stubborn idiot you are," Q said, and Bond repressed a flinch at the insult. "I came because I was worried, and because I miss you."

Mouth already open to argue the first point, the second caught Bond off-guard. She plastered on a fake smile. "Why, Q, I didn't know you cared."

"And that is the whole damn problem," Q said, standing up and stalking over to Bond. Her stance was aggressive, but Bond didn't reach for the machete she'd kept by her feet. She could handle whatever Q threw at her. "You obviously have no bloody clue that I care, or you wouldn't have fucked off to the middle of nowhere without even saying goodbye."

"You had to know this was going to happen," Bond said. "Domesticity isn't for me."

Q scoffed. She was close enough that Bond could see each eyelash. "Really? Because it seemed to fit you pretty well. I used to love my apartment. I made it as cozy as I knew how, and made it mine. Without you there, though, it just felt...empty."

When Q stepped even closer, Bond inhaled deeply through her nose and then said, "If I'm not interpreting this right, I'll stop." She leaned forward, hesitating a breath away from Q's lips, waiting for a response. 

"Trust your instincts," Q murmured, blue eyes locked on Bond. 

Bond kissed Q gently, lifting a hand to lace it through her blonde hair. Unlike their first kiss, this wasn't fueled by the warmth of alcohol. Sunlight streamed through the windows, Bond's thigh ached from her walk to retrieve the other woman, and Q's lips tasted faintly of sunscreen. 

"Do you understand now?" Q asked softly when they parted slightly. "Why I couldn't just leave you out here alone?"

Bond nodded and leaned forward to steal another kiss. They stayed standing in the small bungalow for several minutes, simply kissing. Finally, Bond broke away, not trying to hide her smile. "Did you just imply you want to stay here with me?"

"Hell no," Q said with a smirk. "You're coming back to London with me where it's gray and rainy and free of bugs and mud."

"I don't know," Bond teased, unable to resist brushing another kiss across Q's lips. "I kind of like the bugs."

Q shook her head. "I love you, but I'm not staying in this jungle a day longer than I have to."

"You love me," Bond repeated, voice soft as she brushed a piece of Q's hair away from her eyes. 

Q's expression turned gentle. "Yeah. Seems I do."

In the end, Q agreed to spend one night in the bungalow. It was easy to ignore the rustles and calls of the jungle outside when Bond had her arms wrapped around Q. 

***

"Welcome back," M said when Bond entered his office. "How was your vacation?"

"Is that what we're calling it?" she asked, sliding into the chair across from him. 

"Well, we could consider it medical leave if it weren't for the fact you avoid our medical staff like the plague," M said. "It's a shame we don't have a form for 'agent slunk off the grid to lick her wounds.'"

"Sounds a bit like medical leave, sir," Bond pointed out. 

M laughed. "Maybe, if the wounds I was referring to here were physical. Hurt feelings don't usually get agents off the hook."

"You knew why I left," Bond concluded. 

M nodded. "I've known you for years, Miss Bond. It wasn't hard to parse."

"Let me guess-- Q didn't come up with the idea to go after me on her own."

With a small smile, M demurred, "I'm sure she thinks it was her idea."

"Don't you have more important things to do than play matchmaker?" Bond asked. "Like running the entire British intelligence network?" 

"I like to multitask. Are you complaining?"

In response, Bond set a stack of forms on his desk. Included in the collection were the papers to announce Bond's new place of residence and the conflict of interest between her and the Quartermaster. The stack would have been larger if Bond hadn't named Q her beneficiary and medical contact months before. When M’s knowing smile got too cocky for Bond to stand, she added, “Happy now?”

“That depends,” he said, expression sobering. “Are you? Happy now, that is.”

“I…” Bond hesitated. 

She was still healing from her last mission, but there was a stiffness in her joints that would never go away. After so long in the spy game, Bond had to admit that she was past her prime. Still, there was a clever, beautiful woman who still looked at Bond with a smirk that said she was seeing something Bond couldn't.

“Yes,” she said. “I really am.”


End file.
